Pieces of Tradition
by civillove
Summary: seblaine fic based off Blaine's quote from last night's episode: "When I was with the Warblers, sneaking onto the stage the night before a competition was tradition. There were other traditions I can't really speak about." Dalton AU, Blaine goes back to attend Dalton after Kurt leaves for New York


It's late when he feels a hand snake down his side, fingers dipping under his shirt before lowering to slide between his legs. A soft smile and what he hopes is an irritated sounding noise leaves his lips as he tries to shuffle away. It's Sebastian, of course, for some reason this is one of the many ways he tries to wake him up.

Or well, he _gets_ the reason quite perfectly, but as his eyes flutter open and he looks at the clock on his nightstand the red numbers burn 2:40 AM into his retinas and no, _no_, he's not interested in a 3 AM blowjob in the slightest.

"No," He grumbles. "Come on Seb, lemme sleep. We have a competition tomorrow."

"Did your time at McKinley ruin your hair _and_ your memory?" Sebastian's voice is soft and soothing in his ear, sending shivers down his spine and forcing his legs to squeeze the hand that's resting hintingly close to his crotch.

He knows exactly what Sebastian is talking about, he's even participated and led the group to do so when he attended Dalton earlier in his high school education. Sneaking into the theater and onto stage of the place they were competing at the night before was sort of a tradition. Something that originally started as a way for Warblers to scope out the space and ended up as being an excuse to sneak out of Dalton and head to pre-celebratory party that included practicing numbers, duets and beer pong.

"I heard some of the guys yesterday at Warbler practice, we're not doing it this time." He mumbles, his voice growing more and more tired as he tries to explain, pushing his face into his pillow. "We've performed at McKinley before, there's no point."

The bed shifts and Sebastian turns the bedside lamp on, Blaine groaning and swatting at his boyfriend with a wild hand as he squeezes his eyes shut to block out the onslaught of light.

"Hey!"

"Are you telling me Dalton legend Blaine Anderson is skipping out on a tradition?" He hums. "The _horror_." He clicks his tongue off the roof of his mouth and grins, wide and beautiful, getting off the bed to head to their shared closet.

Blaine manages to sit up rub his fists into his eye sockets, a soft sigh leaving his mouth before he feels fabric swat him in the face. He huffs, looks down at a pair of jeans on his lap and a Dalton sweatshirt.

"Get dressed, come on, if the rest of the Warblers aren't going to do it it's just going to be you and me."

He plays with the fabric between his fingers, swallowing as Sebastian slips on a gray sweater that Blaine thought he had successfully stolen (borrowed) and was hiding back at his parent's place.

"Sebastian." Is all he says and the taller glances over at him with a look that tells him he knows exactly what he wants to say but can't.

He sighs, walks to the bed, runs a hand through Blaine's messy curls with long piano fingers. McKinley isn't just a school for him, it isn't just a singular theater filled with duets, with a stage and seats that will have people and judges in the next few hours.

It's _more_ to him. It's…it's where he had and lost his first love, where he participated with a group of people that meant a lot to him, where he called them friends, and who he lost when he decided to move back to Dalton—a place that feels more like home than any other school has been able to do.

They didn't understand him coming back to Dalton, they didn't take the time to talk to him or really ask. But it was between new friends and people who were his _family, _it was between a show choir group and a place where he was a leader, where he had the title of a legend. Couldn't they have at least _tried_ to understand?

He knows that if he goes back, it won't just be song lyrics that he'll remember. It'll be conversations and touches and kisses with someone who left Blaine and didn't even try to make it work because he was more in love with his dreams and with New York than with him.

"You won't be going back alone." Sebastian says and tilts his head with a smile that reaches down into Blaine's pores, stays there, nestles warmly.

So Blaine decides to go. Because Sebastian's right, he won't be going alone. And he won't be going back in pieces either, like he had left.

000

When he comes back from McKinley, the start of his senior year at Dalton, he's a mess. He's discombobulated, he feels like he's broken into a bunch of pieces that don't really fit together anymore.

His heart and lungs are in New York, he has a hard time breathing when he thinks about the distance, his arms and legs at McKinley, his stomach too, a sinking sensation filling him as he wanders the halls of his old stomping grounds, his rib cage is at Dalton, his head too. Maybe. His head feels heavy and filled with cotton as he tries to get acclimated again, his ribs ripped open and dragging against the pristine wallpaper lining Dalton's hallways.

He's lost. His first day at a place he's longed to be at again for over a year and he's _lost_.

Then he bumps, quite literally, into Sebastian.

And the room stops spinning.

000

He likes watching Sebastian drive. It's a forty-five minute stretch to McKinley and the road is open at 3 AM. They'll make it back in time for the 7 AM rehearsal if they don't spend too much time breaking and entering.

He loses that train of thought as he settles in the passenger seat and leans against the door, eyes fixed on the other.

Sebastian's one leg is bent up a little off the brake, body long and lean and he's honestly surprised he can even fit comfortably in a driver's seat for long periods of time.

His gaze zeroes in on his fingers, wrapped around the steering wheel, thinks about how different his touch is depending on what he's doing. How they can curl and hook and make his breath quicken in all the right ways until it feels like his lungs are burning and how other times they're soft, gentle, comforting in a way he needs them to be.

His face is open and calm. There's no smirk unless he catches Blaine looking. Driving is one of the first times he's realized that the trademark smirk isn't naturally etched and sewn onto the other's skin.

It's only there when he knows people are watching him.

000

Kurt promises to call. To keep in touch. To make distance as painless as possible. Blaine doesn't know what he expects because it's not like Kurt has ever broken promises before. He doesn't wait by the phone, or check his cell, or even his email just in case, he _doesn't_ stalk Facebook and he doesn't scowl when pictures of Kurt and another boy start popping up on his newsfeed and Instagram.

He doesn't understand, isn't sure he wants to. He doesn't get how two people can be so screwed up just because of miles between them. Are roads and bodies of water and sky and grass really things to deteriorate a relationship to the point of not speaking?

Are the miles and road signs and minutes and hours of silence really enough for Kurt to say, "I really don't think this is working, Blaine" for them to be over?

Apparently it is.

Blaine's never hated geography so much in his life.

Sebastian picks up his pieces without permission, wordlessly tries to glue sections of himself back together like he actually _fits_ anymore.

He wants to tell him he doesn't, to tell him to stop trying, to leave him alone. But no words come out and Sebastian just smirks at him.

"Careful Anderson, I've gotten looks like that from people before and most of them have ended up in bed with me by the end of the day."

The ends of Blaine's mouth quirk up and a piece slides back into place.

000

They turn into McKinley's parking lot, the air is cool and seeping through the cracked open windows, chilling the back of Blaine's neck. His eyes slip down Sebastian's form onto his forearms, can see the goosebumps even in the pitch darkness of the night.

The wind glides through his light brown hair like someone's fingers, cheeks a little pink from the sting of it, freckles outlining the bridge of his nose.

He's not sure if anyone has called Sebastian gorgeous before; sexy, handsome and _outstanding_, probably. But maybe gorgeous is his own description that he can keep to himself, like a secret, tucked into the pocket of his polo next to his heart.

"Did you stare at me the whole time again?" He asks, turns the car off and slides the keys out of the ignition.

Blaine smiles and hums, sits up in his seat and doesn't reply, undoes his seatbelt in its place.

"You're ridiculous," There's an affectionate tone there that settles in the base of his belly. "I guess that makes up for all the times I stare at your ass, so."

That smirk is back into place and he's tempted to trace it with his fingertips. He chuckles instead and gets out of the car.

000

The sneaking in isn't a problem, Blaine remembers staying late plenty of times at school for various clubs and the back door to the theater is usually always unlocked due to the laziness of the drama teacher or forgetfulness of Mr. Shue. Either way, he and Sebastian slip inside easily, the one janitor that the school has roaming the halls and avoiding the larger rooms that probably need the most work.

They're alone, the darkness of the theater only adding to how open the space really is. They turn a few lights on backstage, enough to illuminate the actual stage and create a glow that reaches the first few rows of red seats.

Blaine's shoes echo as he treads lightly on the stage, Sebastian walking close behind him, branching out a little as they reach the center. It feels different, the entire space, it's changed somehow…either it has or he has. It could be both. It's probably the latter.

It's less…intimidating than he remembers. He always felt like he had to argue and work his way to the top in New Directions like Rachel had to when he was here instead of just seamlessly fitting into place like at Dalton, as easy as slipping on his blazer.

He had expected heartache and a feeling in his chest like maybe a memory was reaching inside and trying to pull his sternum out through his throat. But that doesn't happen either—surprisingly nothing happens, he's empty, he waits and waits for something to hit him but the only thing that does is Sebastian's warm hand on his lower back.

It's insistent and pressured in all the right ways, fingertips dipping into the back of his jeans, tugging a little on the waistband of his boxer briefs. The move is so very Sebastian in a way where it's stuck between being innocent and suggestive, wide open for Blaine to make a choice.

And maybe that's what he was really waiting for, anyways. His very real and important present, not his past decisions, memories or mistakes coming back to haunt him.

"I'm glad I came back with you."

Sebastian smiles, leans down to brush his lips over Blaine's forehead. "Did you think it'd be hard?"

Blaine chews on his lower lip, looks out at the red seats, sees flashes of New Directions sitting there, of him and Kurt wrapped up on the end watching performances. But there's no regret there in the corner of his heart, like there used to be, the resident emotion long gone and forgotten, melted away.

"I thought it'd feel…different."

"You thought you'd feel lost again."

And it's those words, right there, that really hit home. Sebastian knew Blaine was lost when he came back to Dalton without having to say a word and he wonders how long it's been that the taller seems to know what he needs without even saying it.

He wonders how long he's known him so well and why it had taken him forever just to _see_ that.

He's not lost. He fits somewhere now. There's not an overwhelming sadness either pairing with regret, he doesn't _ache_, it's as if when Sebastian put him back together he left out things that made him fall apart in the first place.

"But I don't."

Sebastian hums, lets his arms slip around Blaine's waist, tug him up against his chest standing center stage. Ridiculous things rest on Blaine's tongue, things that want to slip out about how the other put him back together in ways he shouldn't have been able to… because Kurt had been his soulmate and he never thought that coming back from that was an option.

He was wrong. And he's glad he was.

"You know, I also heard it's a tradition to kiss the most talented guy on the very stage you're going to perform on," Sebastian grins, winking at him, pressing their bodies impossibly close together. "You know, for good luck."

Blaine raises an eyebrow, a small chuckle escaping his throat as their lips graze, Sebastian sneaking his tongue out to drag along his lower lip. A small gasp shudders in his chest, fingers squeezing the other's waist, their noses grazing.

"I think that'll have to be one of the _unspoken_ traditions then." He teases.

Sebastian nips at his lower lip, eyes sparkling. "I couldn't agree more."

Their lips meet, heat is exchanged into one another's pores, sharing the same air as tongues wrestle and teeth click, hands wandering to touch and grasp and hold onto one another like they might melt on the spot.

Blaine feels his final piece, all the way back from New York, slip perfectly back into place behind the left section of his ribcage.


End file.
